Truly Loved + Wholly Surrendered

seeking compassion when judgement tries to win

At the beginning of last year, before I got married, before I moved away, before all that, one of my dear friends (who was also later one of my bridesmaids) invited me out for coffee—and I took her up on the invitation thinking it was going to be a regular catch up, where we share what’s been going on in our lives and how we can pray for one another. turns out, the Lord had other plans.

She encouraged me to write with her. She had a series of prompts and questions to start and it was the most releasing thing that I had during the wedding season. What a gift she gave me: time to sit, reflect, relax, and pour my heart out in writing. What came as a result is something I know the Lord used greatly in the 2025 year.

One of the prompts was to write what we felt or sensed the Lord telling us what to focus on for the year. My word was “compassion.”

As I sat there, I realized that my heart is quick to judge before it is quick to extend compassion. And, I thought maybe it’s just to extend compassion to other people, and while that was something the Lord cultivated and grew in my heart, it wasn’t until recently that I also learned God wanted me to see His compassion towards me. Wait, what?

That I needed to be a recipient of His compassion just like I needed to extend compassion to others? I don’t need compassion. Or so I thought.

The Bible says, “Adonai has compassion on those who fear Him” (Psalm 103:13), and in my pride, I thought that was just salvation. Like, He sent His Son out of compassion and love for me and that was it. There wasn’t a need for a further outpouring of compassion in my life. That was all it was—all I get.

And, that’s just simply not true at all.

The Lord is compassionate to the brokenhearted, the Bible says (see Psalm 34:18). The Lord is compassionate to the weak, the weary, the seeking, those who are knocking and asking; He has compassion on those who are in pain or grief. He thoroughly loves and cares for me in all of my seasons of life: the good, the bad, and the ugly. His heart for me is that I would experience His love and He extends that love in a compassionate way.

He corrects and leads and guides in a compassionate way, not in a judgmental or condemning way (see Romans 8:1). Not only did God want me to learn to extend compassion to others, hear their stories, and even just simply hear them out, He wanted me to hear Him out.

I was going through a season of quite literally changing my life—and in that, I had to learn to be compassionate to my family and friends because they were going through a process too as they were watching me live my life in the mountains. While I am so very grateful for having moved here, I realized throughout this year that I needed to do my part in maintaining the relationships I have, and I could only do that through being compassionate.

Interesting how the Lord works, right? And yet, in that compassion—both seeing the Lord’s compassion towards me and extending it to others—I have realized even more so the depth and the love of the riches of the mercies of God (see Romans 11:33). Being compassionate is not a sign of weakness—it rather is a reflection of Yeshua (or Jesus) who was compassionate to those who came from different backgrounds, life experiences, and cultures.

Learning to receive His compassion was a lot harder than extending it, but once I saw how the Lord shows His compassion, that cultivated in my heart a deeper-rooted knowing of being seen and loved … which results in seeing others the same way. Choosing to care and love rather than assuming or guessing or judging is a difficult, narrow road, but it is that much more life-giving.

Choose compassion, friends. Seek to understand as you learn more about those you love and as you interact with your circle of the world. Be blessed, dear ones.

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“Be compassionate, just as your Father is compassionate to you.” || Luke 6:36, TLV